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Gail (Abendroth) Marciniak, a program assistant in Residence Life, has been named the recipient of the STAR Award for October 2008.

Marciniak, who joined the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh’s staff in 1984, was nominated by Tom Fojtik, director of Residence Life.

Fojtik’s nomination of Marciniak follows:

“Gail has played a significant role in two major efforts by our department, one planned and one most definitely unplanned.

“In the aftermath of the June flood, we had to completely relocate our facilities and custodial operation from the severely flooded River Center to another building. Within 16 hours, Gail was able to set up a temporary office space in the basement of Scott Hall. While the water was still being pumped out of River Center, Gail was processing work orders, answering the phone and responding to e-mail requests for projects that needed to be completed in our 12 other buildings. And she did all this while having to resupply an operation that lost everything in the flood.

“Gail’s calm demeanor, patience and willingness to listen made her an invaluable member of our recovery team. Her quiet leadership helped keep us all on an even keel as we contemplated the impact of six million gallons of brown, murky water destroying our facilities shops, our custodial operation, our former “dry storage” area and all of our vehicles. While others worried openly about how we could possibly recover from this, Gail forged ahead and helped make that recovery happen.

“Oh, and one more thing — we could only use the Scott site for a few weeks before having to relocate again to Fletcher Hall. Once again, Gail was a source of calm throughout this extremely challenging process. She followed this up with assisting with our annual opening weekend, when residence hall students return to campus. Our hall staff gave Gail high marks for answering all their questions and doing everything in her power to make sure our buildings were ready for our 3200 students. She processed more than 100 work orders and made sure every detail was addressed. For these reasons, we believe Gail deserves the STAR Award. “Can-do” staff members like Gail make us proud to work at a place like UW Oshkosh during both the good times and the wet times.”

Winners of the STAR Award receive a framed certificate, a reserved parking space for one month and a gift from University Books & More. The award for exceptional performance is presented each month to a member of the classified staff who has worked at least six months at UW Oshkosh.

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